A Thousand Year Summer
by percivaaal
Summary: Born in the earliest days of civilization in what is now Belarus, Natalya Braginskaya finds herself living while the world around her dies. She watches the centuries pass, and participates in their histories. She navigates her way through love, friendship, loss, family and isolation over the course of a millennium. This is the story of her thousand year summer.
1. Prologue - Ludmilla

The princess of winter is born when the days become shorter. Kupala Night approaches, and the preparations begin for the night when the sun hangs in the sky and does not retreat over the horizon. She enters the world when the moon stands high over the northern Belarusian hills and the leaves of the mixed deciduous forests, where the little village struggles to stand.

Her cry brings a shiver even in the warm midsummer night. The villagers endeavored to revel in the warmth of the sun and forget the horrors of the winter, and despised the rippling of feeling that went from nape to pelvis.

The hopes for this child was high. Recently the village had been besieged by bandits, their few strong men weary from the constant push to hold off the interlopers. The new daughter perhaps would bring a new era of prosperity, a sign that wealth and fortune was to come. In a decade or so, her parents would give her to her husband, in return for cattle, or chickens, or precious fabrics received from traders from faraway lands to the east. With the healthy complexion of the child, their hopes soared.

An elder touched her forehead lovingly. "A lovely daughter," he remarked. "She will grow up strong. A wonderful addition, your children will not disappoint you."

Eighty days after her birth, the village held her brit bat. They dubbed her Ludmilla, or _beloved by the people_, and their intentions for her future.


	2. Chapter One - Besieged

Ludmilla grew up in the beautiful valley among her people. She watched as the sun rose and fell over her land, its lush green beauty in the summer and harsh white glare in the winter all a marvel to her.

Yohanan, when Ludmilla was around ten, came hurtling into the family home, out of breath. "The raiders, they're here again!"

The ruckus of raiders was indeed in the air, the din of heavy metal weapons against leather quite loud, even from inside of the well-built home.

Ludmilla's small hand was taken by Kalyna's larger one, and she was taken to hide in a back room, among their stored goods saved for the upcoming winter. "You must remain quiet," said Kalyna, her voice trembling with fear. Ludmilla felt Kalyna's warm hand press against her mouth, and shut her eyes. Ludmilla prayed that the raiders would leave her brother and parents go. She knew in her heart that they might not.

The sound of warriors pouring into the village filled Ludmilla's ears. Despite their hiding place being quite separated from the commotion outside, the noise was louder than Ludmilla could ever imagine. Ear-splitting screams shot through her head as she heard the thump of bodies on the ground and the footsteps of fleeing villagers.

The last attack had been years ago, and so the village was caught off guard. No longer were the strongest men holding their weapons, accompanying their wives to tend the cows–they had set those down long ago. Ludmilla knew this because her father was the village's only blacksmith, and when she aided him in his workshop, nearly everyday, he only seemed to make tools for farming and shearing, not swords nor spears.

Her worry overcame her. She squirmed against Kalyna, and received a slap on her arm. "Let me go!" whispered Ludmilla, unable to contain her fear and anxiety. She needed to defend her family. The thought of Yohanan out there, with his head sliced open, it was unbearable.

Kalyna's breath caught, her grip tightening on her little sister. The flimsy wooden door to their home was thrown open, and there was the sound of heavy boots on the packed mud flood. Ludmilla whimpered a little, her tears rolling down her face. Kalyna muttered a verse of the Torah to herself, rocking slightly.

The raiders knocked around the room, looking for valuables. It would only be a matter of time before they found the storage closet's small door.

Kalyna whispered to her sister, "Quick, hide yourself under a bag of grain. Make sure your skirt does not show."

She pushed Ludmilla under the bags of grain, and stacked more on top of her in the corner of the room, under various bags of assorted foods. Kalyna hoped to God that the intruders would care less about the grain than the young girl they had found hiding in the closet.

The door to the closet swung open, and Ludmilla heard her sister's muffled shriek as she was grabbed and dragged from the closet. Ludmilla crept out from under her family's winter provisions to see her sister being forced out of their home, and scrambled to the tiny window to watch as she was forced to her knees, beat and chained.

Ludmilla stared, wide-eyed, as her sister sat in the mud, alone with the other villagers. She could not see where Yohanan had gone, nor her parents.


	3. Chapter Two - A New Era

Ludmilla stayed huddled up in that storeroom for another day, sobbing until tears could not fall. The raiders were long gone by then, with their haul of to-be slaves and servants to whomever their lord was.

She crawled into the main room of the dwelling, slowly inspecting what was left. The door had been left ajar, and mice surrounded a piece of stale bread that had fallen to the floor. "Go, get away!" exclaimed Ludmilla, as she herself dove for her bread, shoving it in her mouth before the rodents could protest.

Stepping out of the threshold of her home and into the open, Ludmilla was horrified. The majority of the village had been destroyed by the raiders, and corpses were strewn over the paths and in the wreckages. She bent down next to a body she thought belonged to the baker, but the wounds obscuring his notable features were too heavy and too severe.

Stumbling through the ruins, Ludmilla found nothing. There were no remains familiar to her, no one that could have been her parents or her brother. She knew, with certainty, that her sister had been taken north to serve some warlord, and would not have perished here.

Never before in her life had Ludmilla ever felt so hopeless. No one she knew had ever survived her predicament. She recalled what her mother had recounted to her, on the subject of wolves: a wolf may be discarded and abandoned, and its ability, however existent it was, to join another pack was limited. Ludmilla had nowhere to go. She did not know her grandparents, nor her aunts and uncles.

She collapsed into the mud, curling up and cradling her head. She couldn't believe that her parents were gone north, that her brother and sister had been stolen from her permanently. It wasn't true, it couldn't be possible. In a few hours she would wake up to her sister's snores and her mother's calls.

The soft sound of footsteps towards her did not make her feel threatened immediately, and thus she was quite unprepared for the small hand placed on her shoulder.

A young boy, perhaps her age, offered her his hand. She pushed herself to stand by herself, and with terror in her voice, exclaimed, "Who are you?"

He cautiously took a step forward, his hand still extended. "I come from Hungary. Don't be alarmed, I am quite civil and won't hurt you. I was returning from Poland and heard about the raids here, and decided that I should quite like to see your land."

He did appear to be an upperclassman, with his clean shoulder-length hair, luxurious traveling clothes, a light leather chest plate and a rapier at his side. Perhaps he was a prince sent away to another kingdom by his family–this way he would have a lower chance of being assassinated. It was quite common. If he was a prince, or any sort of nobility, where was his band of soldiers to protect him? He was too well-off to be a peasant sent away as a breadwinner.

Ludmilla was no more comforted by his presence. Her family had been denied by people like his own, simply because they did not believe in his version of God, and refused to become Catholics. She feared that her creed would be resented by him, and end in bloodshed.

The boy noticed her silence and her wide eyes, and asked, "What's your name? I would like very much to help you."

Ludmilla shook her head. "I can't," she stammered, "my parents warned me against telling my name."

He said, with mild disappointment at her refusal, "My name is András, I come from Budapest, an old Roman town far southwest of here. I find your home extremely beautiful, I am sorry it was destroyed."

She shook her head for it had not been destroyed. She, however, was not fond on letting this boy into her family home. Saying nothing, Ludmilla slowly began to formulate a plan to escape his clutches.

András smiled again, and said, "I am traveling with a band of friends, if you would like to join us and come with us in our return to Budapest. I think that you are a lot like us."

Ludmilla nervously responded, "Look, I think you have made a mistake. I can't come with you, I must retrieve my parents and my siblings. Then I will come back to here and continue my life."

András contemplated her answer quietly, and said, "I will return."

He did not come back for a long time after walking down the trail leading out of the village, still littered with her fallen neighbors. The sun fell down from the sky and beneath the hilly horizon, and night set in. Ludmilla found herself nibbling on a crust of bread in the darkness. Her encounter with the boy had shaken her, not to mention her earlier traumas. Did he understand that it was not the same for her as it was for him? She was not a noble, she was not invincible, she was just the daughter of the blacksmith in a backwater village, ignored largely by the governing bodies that lorded over the lands.

Clearly András's village, Budapest, was not the same; she had never heard of it, but for such an influential young man to originate there it had to have some notoriety.

After all of her introspection, and her contemplation of András's offer, Ludmilla had not yet come to a decision should he really make an appearance once more.

The next morning, the first in her life without her family, and the beginning of a new era, Ludmilla was more torn up about the massacre than the boy. It smelled awful, and she had an awful ache in her heart. She missed her mother's sweet voice, her father's comforting presence, her sister's steady protection and her brother's quiet demeanor.

She quickly got to work with her traditional early-morning chores, like sweeping and cleaning the dirt and soot from various surfaces. She then removed a container of butter from a cabinet, and spread it on a piece of stale bread. Sitting near the fire she had created in the fireplace, Ludmilla quietly devoured her breakfast.

She had just finished when a heavy knock sounded from the front door. She inched from her positing on the ground across the dirt floor and to the door, made from planks of wood, and peered through the gaps between planks. She could not discern exactly who it was who knocked, and curiosity overwhelmed her, driving her to open the door.

Outside a tall boy, maybe two years older than herself–Yohanan's age, she remembered–stood, boring holes into her with his intense eyes. He was shoved aside by András, who said quickly, "This is Giselbert–a friend of mine I told you about." He motioned to another boy, shorter, who stood behind them. "And this is our friend Toris. They're all quite nice."

Ludmilla was mesmerized by the intensity of Giselbert's pure white hair. She had never seen such a thing in a young boy.

Curiously, and a little spooked, Ludmilla asked, "How did you find me?"

"Smoke," said Giselbert, with some hesitation. His voice was rough and much deeper than András's. "My friend told me that you're coming with us back to Budapest. Your parents aren't coming back, and it would be safer for you to come with us."

Even though she didn't want to admit it, Giselbert had a point–no one she knew had come back from where the raiders took them. It was a death sentence. Yet she could not bring herself to abandon everything she had ever known–very rarely in her short life had she seen the outside world. To travel so far away was inconceivable.

But it did not appear, in her circumstances, that Ludmilla had any choice in the matter–there was nothing left for her.


	4. Chapter Three - A Sixth Sense

A few weeks after her parents' kidnapping, Ludmilla sat on a damp log in the middle of an ancient forest in a land she had never seen before. It would not be a surprise to her if she was the first of her line to ever leave, to see the trees she saw now, to leave the land in which her family had found such solace. Her mother had warned her against the dangers lying just outside the village borders. Warriors from Scandinavia descended and killed hundreds of unsuspecting peasants at a time, kingdoms hurt their subjects for not conforming to the religion standards, kings sent entire armies to fight another army in melee combat with little regard to human life. Would she be exposed to that so early?

Her companions still did not know her name, and when she questioned why they had taken such a massive detour from Poland into Belarus, they avoided the question. András's story really didn't hold up from her perspective. There was a large amount of distrust, not just between Ludmilla and the others, but between the boys themselves. András and Giselbert seemed to enjoy butting heads, and did so regularly. Toris was just as quiet as always.

Giselbert and Toris spoke very little Ruthenian, and conversation between each other became extremely difficult with the language barrier. Ludmilla found that Toris spoke some Yiddish as one of his best friends had taught him a good percentage of the language. She attempted to get answers out of him as well, but he avoided them with razor precision.

On the fourth week of her travels, András happily reported to her that they were nearing their destination. So far Ludmilla had seen so many new places, but was weary from the stress put on her from her family's ordeal and her great voyage to the southwest.

During the long walk to Hungary, he had also taught Ludmilla some Hungarian, enough for her to get a start there. András very much confused Ludmilla. He was incredibly nice for a noble; Ludmilla's people had not had a great run with Christian authorities. She was obviously very grateful for his aid, but did not entirely trust him.

Over the last few days, a feeling had awoken in her that she had not been previously aware of. The trio of boys had a strange energy that she, all at once, had never felt or seen, but was quite familiar to her. She wanted to say something to András, but felt that it would be strange and out of bounds for her to bring something somewhat personal up with him.

As for Giselbert and Toris, neither of them struck her as entirely trustworthy. Giselbert appeared to be somewhat silly, from what she understood, but was not serious about what he did not care for. For example, he couldn't care less if Ludmilla was mauled by a bear, but would destroy everything in his path to save András. They were extremely close, it was easy to see.

Toris, on the other hand, was the quiet type, neither brooding nor anxious. She wondered if her situation was at all similar to his. András and Giselbert had obviously known each other for far longer than they had known Toris, and they were not completely on good terms; Giselbert and Toris regularly disagreed, and had the occasional heated argument.

He sat on a log across from her, wet from the recent rain. Toris grumbled as he attempted fire with a fire kit and moist wood. Giselbert walked up from behind him and put a hand on his shoulder. "You know what would be very funny?" he asked, speaking Hungarian in a harsh accent.

Toris didn't look up, but humored Giselbert. "What would that be?"

Giselbert grinned, and replied, "If a bandit shot me in the back with a bow and arrow," and promptly stumbled and fell onto Toris's log.

"Fuck!" shouted Toris, standing up and dropping the flint and steel that he was holding. They tumbled onto the bed of dead leaves below him, as he fell on Giselbert, attempting to remove the arrow.

Shouting in the forest erupted, and from it ran András. He and Giselbert had gone to find plants that they could make a meal out of, and must have stumbled on a band of bandits, or had been stumbled upon. There had been a few close brushes in the last few months, so it was not a surprise that there would be an attack, but for a band of ten-year-olds it was worrying.

András's skills with the sword were impressive, but he could not hold off a duo grown men without his partner in action, Giselbert. He was still collapsed on the log, gasping in pain as Toris extracted the arrow the best he could.

In that moment, Ludmilla knew she had to do something, despite being frozen with fear.

She had to break free. She knew this, but couldn't seem to shake the hold of panic on her body. She couldn't move her head, nor her eyes, nor her feet, not with all the strength in her body. "Help me!" shouted András, glancing at Toris.

Her feet inched forward, away from the log, but on it she remained, an invisible barrier depriving her of saving András.

Then Ludmilla remembered the sacrifice made by her sister. So selfishly had Kalyna given her freedom to save her, and here Ludmilla was using her liberty to let someone, whom had shown her such kindness, be run through.

With a sudden burst of resolve, Ludmilla stood, and from her belt drew her skinning knife. It was small, but so sharp to ensure that the skin slid off the bone easily. She wouldn't have to use too much force to leave a mark.

Hopping over the obstacles in her path and weaving through thin trees, Ludmilla snuck up from behind one of the men. They hadn't noticed her yet, they were preoccupied with András. He put up too much of a fight.

She lodged her knife into the base of his neck and twisted it, a spray of blood going up in the air. He screamed and flailed his sword back towards her, and with his hand clapped over the wide gash in his neck, set his sights on her. With a quick step, she reversed towards the camp, hand held her hands in front of her to protect her chest area from attack. Blinded with anger, he slashed at her, allowing her to avoid the imprecise attacks.

He charged at her, his sword outreached towards her body, longing to make content with her organs. With a level of swiftness she was not aware she had, she avoided the attack and instead rebutted it with a well-aimed stab at his side.

Stumbling towards her, he fell to his knees, a blank look in his eyes, and fell to the ground. Panting, she became hyper aware of her surroundings. The golden and red leaves on the ground were dappled with soft light filtering through the dense canopy overhead. The sky was bright blue, but the light warned of an upcoming shower of rain. The violence was entirely misplaced in Ludmilla's opinion.

Jolting back to reality, Ludmilla dashed forward to András just as he thrust his blade into the abdomen of the second bandit with a grunt. The man fell as András did himself, the both of them falling from injury, the former far more severe. Stumbling onto András's body, she exclaimed, "András, you're hurt!"

"I know," he replied with a smirk, his head dropping to the grown and letting out a groan. "Help me up, I can see smoke from Budapest town, we must make good time."

With ease, Ludmilla hoisted him to his feet, grunting a little. She had spent time in the fields, but did not possess enough strength to completely support his weight. She shuffled to Toris, and said, "Let's go. We can get medical attention when we get them home."

Toris shook his head. "Giselbert can't walk, I'll have to carry him. I think the arrow damaged his spine. We need to rest."

He had a point, but so did the clamor of armed swordsmen from a distance, back in the dense forest. They would be coming soon to avenge their fallen brothers in arms, and to kill Ludmilla's protectors. She couldn't let that happen, not after what they had done for her. She owed them a debt for taking her on.

"No," she said, "we must press on. It is of utmost importance that we get them back. More are coming, and neither of them will make it in this condition."

Toris looked doubtful for a moment, but gave in after a moment's thought. "Fine. Let's go."


	5. Chapter Four - Óbuda

The early June air and the bright sun above them highlighted the magnificent city ahead. Together, the three towns Pest, Buda and Óbuda towered over the landscape, bustling with activity. Ludmilla had never seen so many humans in one place.

Weakly, András said, "Go to Óbuda, we must find my family's home."

Toris and Ludmilla obliged, and carried the two injured boys down into the town. They had been walking for the better part of the past two days, rushing to escape any further attack.

The town was much dirtier than Ludmilla's home. She suspected that none of the townsfolk had ever taken a bath before. They dumped their urine and feces in the streets, and animals lived amongst the humans. That last part she was familiar with, but Ludmilla took a bath everyday, and so the absolute filth many of the townsfolk surprised her.

She blamed the muck on the high density of the town; she much preferred isolation of the forest, even after five minutes in the city. The worst part of it was the stench of a thousand bodies and their excrete, all together.

András's legs dragged weakly in the mud. She pulled him through the narrow streets, and the weight of his body and the potential she knew he harnessed had her thinking of his true age. No preteen of Natalya's age or even slightly older, like Giselbert, had that skill in sword fighting. Or anything else, for that matter. Giselbert and Toris were like this as well. The three overall seemed older than they appeared to be.

"Don't worry," Toris said quietly to Giselbert. "We're almost there."

Giselbert had been nearly unconscious the whole trip since the attack, and Ludmilla feared he had lost too much blood. She prayed that he would be able to recover.

The entrance to what Ludmilla presumed to be the home of András was much grander than she had previously expected. The great door was of dark oak, with gold painted accents. A coat of arms cast in metal stood out proudly, shining in the midday sun. The entire residence was made of fine marble blocks, cut to perfection. Shimmering stained glass depicting lands in the ancient land of the Magyars was visible from outside, and she was quite sure that inside it was stunning.

Toris knocked firmly upon the door. The guard who answered was tall and fit, and dressed head to toe in chain male. "Your highness!" he gasped, taking András from her arms.

Slowly András was led inside, with Toris, Ludmilla and the unresponsive Giselbert trailing behind quietly. "Quickly!" shouted the guard. "Fetch the physician! The prince has returned!"

_The prince_. Ludmilla had not been aware that she was in the care of the prince. She had thought that he was the son of some noble, but the prince? It was unheard of for a prince to come to a small village in the north of the Principality of Kiev. From the great Hungarian kingdom, even more so.

A woman swathed in and blue purple silks rushed from a dark room across the hall to where András had gone, wailing with fear. She babbled in quick Hungarian, so quick that Ludmilla could not easily pick up what was being said. They followed suit, entering a dark room lit by dim candles and a slit of a window.

An elderly man labored on András's wounds, quietly pouring elixirs over them, and stitching together gashes he had received. His assistant took the limp Giselbert from Toris, and immediately began to remove the arrow that was still lodged in the base of his neck. Small groans of pain erupted from the previously silent Giselbert–at least he was still alive.

Another middle aged man draped in red stained furs and expensive clothes dashed into the now-operation room, and collapsed next to András, talking to him quietly. Toris and Ludmilla were left there to stand just inside the entrance.

A maid was summoned to the woman's side and she whispered a few concerned words in the direction of the awkward duo, and right away they were whisked into a less grandiose section of the house, in the back room next to the kitchen. The maid set out two beds, and put delicate linens over a feather mattress. Ludmilla had never slept on a real bed before. She had always had a pillow and thick blanket on the packed dirt floor, so the bed was a novelty to her.

She set down her bag, and, rubbing a small pendant given to her by her mother in the shape of a Star of David, sat slowly on the soft bed.

Toris said in slow Yiddish, "I haven't been to Óbuda before. Not Hungary completely. Before two months ago, I had never left the North Sea."

"I have never seen such a large town!" remarked Ludmilla. "So populous... I miss the countryside."

He nodded. With furrowed eyebrows, Toris suddenly posed the question, "What is your name?" and Ludmilla froze up. "I–I cannot tell you. My mother... she would forbid me from telling a stranger."

"You know mine," said Toris gently, "and I promise not to hurt you. I think we're in this together now, and I should like to understand who you are."

"My name," she said, terrified that her mother would break down the door and drag her outside to publicly flog her, "is Ludmilla. My family is known as Braginsky, so that would make me Ludmilla Braginskaya."

"My family name is Laurinaitis," replied Toris thoughtfully. "We were fishers. I'm Lithuanian, if you didn't know. András and Giselbert found me, just after their voyage through Poland and Pomeriania."

Wording her question carefully, Ludmilla asked, "Why us? Why did they take us specifically?"

Toris did not answer, and they sat in silence for a few moments.

Then came a quiet knock, and the same maid that had installed them in their new living quarters took them back out into the room with Toris on his back, stitches fresh in his skin, and Giselbert quietly dozing in a bed. The two adults they had seen by András's side smiled as they saw Toris and Ludmilla enter the room. "You two helped my son and Prince Giselbert?" he demanded, his tone stern as his eyes bore holes into Ludmilla's soul. He was quite intimidating.

"Yes, your highness," said Toris, his voice high with anxiety. "We were ambushed, and we helped them here."

"What are your names?" asked the woman, presumably András's mother. "Why did you find yourselves traveling with my son?"

Ludmilla piped up in broken Hungarian, her own voice quaking just as Toris's had done. "I come from the Braginsky family. My village was attacked by raiders from Novgorod, or Polotsk, and I found myself the orphan of likely dead or enslaved parents. His highness found me and took me in."

She nodded with skepticism, her eyes narrowed. Her head shifted to focus on Toris. "And you, young man, what have you to say?"

"My story is similar to my friend. I am called Toris. I come from the north, and my village fell to Scandinavians. I escaped to find the prince and Prince Giselbert watching on, and I was taken away to find Ludmilla in the Great Principality of Kiev." He noticed András's mother's face twist with confusion, and clarified, "Ludmilla is the girl whose family was called Braginsky."

Ludmilla saw András's mouth slip into a smile as he learned her name. He mouthed it to himself, and committed it to memory.

With that clarification, the woman seemed satisfied, and moved to carry on with her own introduction. "I am Queen Elizabeta, and my husband is called King Nikolas, and we reign over the Kingdom of Hungary."

The king stood, and with a slight smile on his face, said, "You have done my family a great service. András must have found you two quite special to have brought you here. Since you are orphaned and you are András's friends, I shall take you on as my charges. This is an extremely particular situation, and however eccentric it is of me to take on two foreign children, I find that you two have the same extraordinary qualities as András did when we took him in."

This detail was very much to Ludmilla's surprise. She had not known that the Hungarian king had a son whom was adopted, or knew that they were considered legitimate successors to the throne. Aside from this developing mystery regarding András's past, Ludmilla felt an extreme amount of gratitude towards the charitable king and queen. "I am honored to accept your offer," Toris said, a note of disbelief in his voice. Ludmilla reported the same.

From then on, Ludmilla became not just Ludmilla, daughter of the farmers from Kiev, but her grace Ludmilla, charge of the Hungarian king.


	6. Chapter Five - The Royal Hungarian Court

Much to Ludmilla's relief, András and Giselbert both recovered relatively well, the former better than the latter. Giselbert had no feeling in his legs, however. He joked bitterly that he would actually be able to walk through fire for his friends–he had already shown his willingness to in any case. Ludmilla wondered what would have happened if he had not told them of the bandits–surely they would have heard the clanging of swords, but Ludmilla would not, perhaps, been able to help András beat them off.

Since their arrival, Ludmilla's life had changed dramatically. She went from the daughter of a farmer to the responsibility of a king in the matter of a few minutes–and why, she wasn't exactly clear. András promised, the day after their return, that he would explain when the time came. Ludmilla wondered when that time would be, now filling her days with with embroidering, feasting and other activities only the rich could afford. Her former ratty, worn, threadbare tunic and skirt had been replaced with a white cotehardie and a yellow sideless surcoat decorated with little red flowers and green leaves. Her hair was brushed and was braided into a single long plait down her back. Her mother would have said that the pattern and the craftsmanship was too beautiful to wear, and it should be used as a wall hanging instead.

It was quite a strange turn of events that a king and queen would so charitably take in orphans from other principalities and kingdoms–a peasant girl, no less. Many would have compensated Toris and Ludmilla for their time and sent them on their way, but King Nikolas kept them as he would his own children. They were seamlessly adopted into the court with little commotion, as if such adoption were normal. Even a peasant from the north like Ludmilla would know that it was not, especially in a royal setting. Blood really did matter in many circumstances.

That made her wonder what their intentions were. Did they know something that she did not? Was she simply a novelty? A farming girl from the Principality of Kiev was certainly hard to come by in Óbuda, and she continually asked herself if she was a member of court as some form of entertainment.

It was not long before she was questioned by heads of the military what had happened to her family. She said, simply, that her village was raided and her parents were either carried off or killed by the attackers. Ludmilla reported the same of her siblings. Their brows furrowed, they conferred with each other and decided that likely the raiders had returned home, and would not have followed the river passages towards the city.

With the news of the persistent attacks in the north, however, the king grew increasingly concerned with the state of his kingdom. Would the attackers–it was unclear at this point whether or not they were Scandinavian or truly from Novgorod, as she had said–travel by river to the capital? Would his lands come under siege? Would his allies'?

Toris approached her perhaps a week after their arrival, and said, "I am very curious. I have been thinking of your question, and I have been watching."

Ludmilla did not know what he meant by watching. He was not very specific when it came to his activities. He never was. "What are your conclusions?"

Toris was silent, and denied her an answer for a moment. "Have you found anything about our arrival?"

She shook her head. She had been preoccupied with things that noble girls were supposed to do–embroidering, painting, sewing, praying. Toris, on the other hand, had been let loose with András, out in the world to do whatever he pleased. Giselbert was still confined to the infirmary, nursing his wounds, so Ludmilla felt more companionship with him than with Toris at this point.

"Well... I would love to say that I have, but I think that I am not quite as good with questioning. I propose for us to work in tandem–we should be able to find more if we coordinate. I say this because both princes are holding back on something."

The children sat in silence, the suggestion heavy in the air and heavy on their minds. Ludmilla finally nodded, and said, "I think that our cooperation would be wise. We have only each other–András and Giselbert perhaps are not to be trusted."

A warm, gentle breeze swept through the stone corridor in which both sat, the reds and yellows and greens of their clothes reflecting off of the stone walls, and on the clear windows open to the world. The scent of fresh-baked bread, horses and mud wafted through. Toris's shoulder-length hair was tied up in a ponytail, and rustled with the wind. "I miss home. I miss the ocean," he said.

"I miss my parents, Yohanan, Kalyna...," replied Ludmilla quietly. She wondered if she would ever see them again. It seemed unlikely. Kalyna was probably married off to some soldier or warlord, and Yohanan was either a slave or a soldier or dead. She had not said good bye to any of them. Ludmilla pondered if Toris's parents were still alive. The Scandinavians were brutal, but she had heard of raiders of different nationalities among their ranks.

Toris nodded, and his eyes became slightly watery. "I want to find out why I survived, and not them." His voice was uncharacteristically shaky.

Ludmilla stood, and offered her hand to her grieving friend. "I think, for now, we should be family."

Toris agreed quietly, and the pair set off down the hall, into the courtyard. The sun was hot on their backs. It felt good to hold his hand, and for the first time in a long time, she did not feel quite as alone. It was almost as if Kalyna was holding her again.


End file.
